


Untitled

by revolving_doors



Category: Inception (2010)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-29
Updated: 2013-08-29
Packaged: 2017-12-25 00:52:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,991
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/946733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/revolving_doors/pseuds/revolving_doors
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A fictional tale in which Arthur sucks at being sick, Cobb foolishly dares to give Arthur’s point position to Eames and Eames proves once again that he’s perfectly capable of dealing with anything the world chooses to throw in his direction.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untitled

 

The fourth time Arthur interrupts the dreamscape walk-through to cough into a handkerchief and rub at his bloodshot eyes Cobb stares at him sharply and declares, “Arthur, enough. You’re off the job. Eames, do you think you can you forge and take point?”

Eames positively beams at the idea. “It would be my pleasure.”

Arthur wants to protest but he starts coughing so hard in the dream – and in reality apparently – that it acts as a kick and he wakes bleary-eyed to the collective glares of an unamused team.

*

Arthur refuses to stay at the hotel in bed, choosing instead to stumble around the warehouse and prove to everyone just how not sick he is. Ariadne shoos him away after a sneeze catches him off-guard and he accidentally knocks over all the little cardboard walls she’s just spent the last hour meticulously arranging.

He wanders over to the far end of the warehouse and leans against Eames’ desk. Eames resolutely ignores him, busy concentrating on blue-prints Arthur has already gone through. He’s sucking on the end of Arthur’s Mont Blanc platinum fountain pen, muttering to himself as he draws circles around – and really? _Drawing_ on the actual blueprints? – various stairwells. The only acknowledgment Arthur gets of his presence is when a hand stretches out to absently rub at his back as he doubles over and racks his way through another coughing fit.

Arthur shrugs Eames’ hand from between his shoulder blades and rights himself, pulling the threadbare blanket Dom had insisted wrapping around him earlier closer to his chin. He starts to flick through the file Eames has just put down, tutting at the scrawl covering half of one of his carefully prepared documents.

“You are being thoroughly distracting Arthur, and not in a good way,” Eames complains, looking up finally and snatching the file back. He places it on the other side of the desk as far away from Arthur as possible. “I’m sure Yusuf could rustle you up some kind of magic pill if you asked nicely.”

In fact, Yusuf has already offered but Arthur’s being stubborn. Being high as a kite on Yusuf’s jacked-up cough syrup would mean leaving Eames entirely unsupervised doing _Arthur’s_ job and there is no scenario in this world or a dreamed one where Arthur would class that as a sensible course of action.

“I’m not that sick,” Arthur huffs.

“Indeed.”

“It’s just a cold.”

“Apparently.”

To illustrate just how not sick he is Arthur stretches over Eames to get the file back but instead ends up sneezing and falling headfirst into Eames’ lap.

Eames sighs loudly and caps Arthur’s pen with more force than necessary. “Okay, fine. You want to do this the hard way we can do this the hard way.” He manhandles Arthur away from the desk and frog marches him towards the large stainless steel doors at the end of the warehouse. “Dom, I’ll be back in an hour.”

Arthur has every intention to stand his ground and firmly tell Eames that he is perfectly capable of doing the work, except he’s not sure which Eames he should address since there’s now one holding his shoulder sternly and another drifting around Arthur's peripheral vision in hazy concentric circles.

*

“I’m perfectly capable of finding my own way to my own room,” Arthur grumbles when they reach the hotel lobby.

Eames keeps an insistent hand on the small of Arthur’s back, propelling him towards the elevator. “I’m sure you are. I’m just not sure you’re capable of staying there.”

They ride the elevator in stalemate, Arthur unable to makes Eames leave, Eames not letting Arthur go.

When they reach the room Eames slides the keycard he’s pickpocketed from Arthur’s jacket down the lock and nudges Arthur through the door.

“I do know one way of making you stay in bed,” he grins mischievously when the door clicks shut, grabbing at the lapels of Arthur’s jacket and sliding it from his shoulders.

Arthur stands stock still and glares at him. “If I'm apparently too sick to work the job then I'm definitely too sick to have sex with you.”

But when Eames pushes him slowly down onto the bed he doesn’t protest. When Eames joins him, straddling Arthur on his hands and knees as he undoes the buttons of Arthur’s shirt he doesn’t protest either.

“I’m probably infectious,” he adds as an afterthought.

“Not to worry. In my long and arduous experience the only remedy to a malady such as yours is a medicinal hand job. Now, the most effective cure would be a blow job but with the way you’ve been jerking around during those coughing fits of yours I don’t think that would end well for either of us.” Eames hands are already on his belt – button – fly - palming Arthur through his white cotton briefs.

Arthur wants to lie back and think of England – so to speak - but they don’t usually do this at work. Before a job, after a job, between jobs, yes, but when the team has been assembled Arthur has very strict lines that he does not cross (and he always books them separate hotel rooms on separate floors to emphasize this point).

So it’s not entirely his fault that he’s half naked under an Eames who’s very focused on his mission to conquer Mount Arthur and his –albeit illness inhibited – mind still thinks it’s work time.

“How did the follow-up background check on Nigel Hardwick go?”

“I’m sorry?” Eames looks up from where he’s busy sucking a bruise just above where Arthur’s hip disappears into black pinstripe. “Are we in the warehouse right now? While I’m more than capable of multi-tasking how about we don’t talk about work when I have my hands down your trousers.”

“You need to make sure he hasn’t been militarized.”

“I know.”

“And his father has a secret internet gambling account that could be the key to -”

“ _I know_.” Eames pulls at Arthur’s pants impatiently, throwing them across the room when Arthur is finally free of them. He clambers up Arthur’s prone body. “Now be quiet and let me administer your medicine.”

Arthur lets out a moan as a hand tugs playfully at his balls before gripping firmly at his shaft.

“There’s a good boy,” Eames purrs appreciatively, mouthing at Arthur’s neck.

He works a steady rhythm until Arthur comes with a strangled, wheezing sigh, hand tangled up in Eames’ hair as he presses kisses to Arthur’s jaw.

*

Afterwards Eames hands him a pill and a glass of water. “Just a little something to help you sleep, darling.” It’s blood red, the size of a horse tranquilizer and has Yusuf’s name all over it.

Arthur takes it and it’s only as he’s drifting off that he realizes Eames is still there, propped up on one elbow watching him, his other hand splayed out across Arthur’s chest.

*

Eames is gone when Arthur wakes up, the only evidence that he was there a hand-scrawled piece of hotel stationary on the bedside table with arrows that point up to another giant red pill _eat me_ and down to a glass of water _drink me_.

*

Arthur drags himself out of bed and into the previous day’s suit. He really must be ill if he’s not bothering to shower. Even he will admit that his walk is a little meandering at best – and the sky might just be a pale pink with green clouds – but he manages to hail a cab and get to the warehouse by early afternoon.

Dom and Ariadne are hooked up to the PASIV, Yusuf is tucked away in his makeshift lab and Eames, well Eames is sitting at Arthur’s desk wearing an exquisite glen check flannel jacket that by the cut of it has to be from Saville Row.

Arthur will be on his deathbed the day he can’t tell the difference between Anderson & Sheppard and H. Huntsman.

It marks a stark contrast from the usual mishmash of jackets, shirts and pants Eames apparently classes as suitable work attire.

“What do you think you’re doing?” Arthur huffs, annoyed at Eames _and_ the suit _and_ the fact that when he talks it sounds like he has a mouth full of mothballs.

“Working.”

“At _my_ desk? Wearing _that_?”

Eames looks up from the computer screen and winks. “Imitation is the highest form of flattery.”

“Says the forger,” Arthur snipes.

“Says the _Point Man_ ,” Eames corrects with a smirk. Arthur’s not sure but he thinks he hears Eames mutter something like _I knew I should have got Yusuf to make the damn thing stronger._

Arthur is just about ready to burst. Sure, it’s a straight down the line extraction job and Arthur knows Eames can do it - it’s not hard or complex and Eames always contributes to more than his fair share of the planning – but _Arthur’s_ the Point Man and he wouldn’t go around doing someone else’s job. But then his head feels like someone’s trying to inflate a balloon inside it and his nose starts running again and Eames is plucking the handkerchief out of his breast pocket and dabbing at Arthur’s nose and the tirade he’s planning on inflicting gets lost in mucus and pathetic sniffles. He does manage to grab the handkerchief in annoyance but that only ends in him feeling blindly for the desk as he starts to lose his balance.

Eames simply points at a lawn chair set up next to the desk, complete with blankets and a pillow that look suspiciously similar to those at the hotel. “Sit. Wallow in your malaise. Do not disturb me unless Death himself is challenging you to a game of chess.”

Arthur obliges begrudgingly since the blankets look awfully comfortable and truthfully, being vertical makes the world swim at the edges. He’s vaguely aware of voices around him, Yusuf talking about changing the potency of different compounds to help with the ~~fever~~  kick, Ariadne waxing lyrical about the wonders of ~~chicken soup~~  Penrose triangles and Dom saying that ~~when Philippa came down with a similar thing he didn’t sleep for days~~  the mark is on the move. He’d join in with their conversations but it hurts to open his eyes and his throat burns as if he’s just downed a bottle of whiskey, only the fuzziness he feels when he tries to move his head is nothing like the light-headedness of happily drunk.

*

When he wakes later the warehouse is dark, save for the dull glow of streetlights through dusty windows.

There’s a hand on his forehead. It feels nice.

“How did it go?” he asks, shrugging his shoulders up into a sleepy stretch.

“Job done, information extracted," Eames replies, nudging Arthur to shift so he can perch on the edge of the lawn chair.   "I forge a very good Point Man if I do say so myself.” Eames sounds entirely too pleased with himself.   But then his voice drops a couple of notches and his hand moves from Arthur’s forehead, stroking back through his hair.   “Truth be told, it wasn’t the same without you. You bring a certain finesse to the proceedings that no-one else could ever hold a candle to.”

It turns out that was all Arthur needed to hear and with that single sentence his mood improves ten-fold. No-one likes to think of themselves so easily replaceable, extraneous to future requirements.

Arthur slinks his hands out from underneath the blankets.   “I’m sure you were perfectly competent,” he says, sliding the knot of Eames’ tie until the long piece of silk is completely free of Eames’ neck and then reaching for the top button of his waistcoat. “And competence is a very attractive attribute.”

“I see you’re feeling better,” Eames grins, his own hands moving to assist Arthur in the further undoing of buttons.

“Not really,” Arthur lies.

“Well, luckily I have just the remedy.”

*

Somewhere in his still very foggy mind Arthur thinks he can smell chicken soup.

[fin]


End file.
